Tag Archives: Assignment 3

Home is Where the Art is

Introduction

Marlborough Open Studios is an annual collaborative event in which forty local artists open their homes and studios over four weekends to allow the public access to them and their work. It is a selling event, but the artists are all happy to talk about what they do without any commitment to buy. Over the course of two weekends, I was lucky enough to see the work of twenty two artists; two were photographers, and the others used a variety of media including printmaking, glasswork, sculpture and collographs. I have discounted the photographers from this project, as I did not feel comfortable about asking them if I could photograph their work. Men were also discounted, being in the minority (less than 30%) in what turned out to be a very female event. Other artists were happy for me to do so and were very willing to explain their techniques for me.
The background work which informed this assignment is outlined in the following posts:https://hollyocaidentityplace.wordpress.com/2017/07/28/background-for-assignment-3-the-female-studio/https://hollyocaidentityplace.wordpress.com/2017/07/24/yet-another-attempt-to-find-a-subject-for-assignment-3/

Context

This project is based on a series of visits made under the umbrella of the Marlborough Open Studios Art Trail. Each artist in the Open Studios has been selected by her peer group as being worthy to be a part of a group which showcases the best of what North Wiltshire artists have to offer. My thanks go to the following artists who allowed me to photograph them and their work environment:

The 20th century rise in women’s autonomy based on their increasing presence in the formal workplace, and the consequent financial authority this brought has begun to allow women to demand the same amount of personal space within the home that men have always had, whether it be their own study for private contemplation or a larger space to explore artistic pursuits. It also brings into focus how women and their partners view the work that she does in “her” space. Allocating a specific, unique room for her creativity gives the undertaking a legitimacy which has previously been absent in the historically gendered view of art pursuits. As a woman, the possession of a personal studio in the modern world takes art from being a plaything to being a serious undertaking, which indicates independence and personal autonomy as well as financial stability. Her own studio is a strong representation of her identity and the value of her work to herself and to her partner, if she has one. Each of the women below has turned either a room within the home or an outside space into a studio, which enables them to combine work and domesticity. As noted in my response to my tutor’s comments, these women have comfortable lifestyles, with both time and space to pursue their interests, and an avenue for further study would be to investigate how, where and whether more economically deprived women express themselves creatively.

Photographs

Rosalind Hewitt, glasswork

Kim Pethybridge, sculpture

Belinda Harding, glass sculpture

Mary Thorne, ceramics

Bryony Cox, drawing

Arty Pumpkin, mixed media

Sue Lashmar, glasswork

Reflective commentary

The purpose of this assignment was to reveal either a mirror of a community one knows and how it affects the photographer personally, or a window onto a community that the photographer did not previously know. A review of my blog posts for this assignment reveals that I struggled to settle on a subject for several months. My initial idea of using mirrors in the literal as well as metaphorical sense using photography en abyme is something I would like to return to later when my skills have improved, and I was advised by fellow students that the next iteration using my village’s annual carnival was not working. Thanks are due to fellow student Kate513940 for her suggestion that I look at the Open Studios for a more revealing subject, and something upon which I could base a windows project.

This was not a linear project, in which the order of the images is important. Of more interest to me was the question of whether to include some of the artworks or to focus purely on the spaces themselves. I decided on the latter because it was better reflective of my background research. My original plan had been to produce a series of diptychs, each showing the artist and one of her pieces, but this seemed too static , on reflection. I also looked at the possibility of showing the artists directly relating to me, the photographer, as the process of capturing the images was so voluble and enjoyable but did not have enough good quality images to produce a series. Like all events of this type, one is having to work “on the hoof” and allowing other visitors to speak to the artists, and so there was a limit to what could be achieved. However, the organiser of the event asked me if I would like to produce some photographs for next year’s catalogue, and suggested that it might be mutually beneficial for me to go back after the Open Studios was over and to spend some time watching and photographing individual artists at work. I may do this over the winter as part of my rework for assessment.

I have done some rework as suggested by my tutor, and have reshot the last one, of Sue Lashmar as I was unhappy with the lighting in the first version. The focus in no. 6 is not quite as sharp as I would have liked, but I think the image should be included as the composition and the artist’s expression are revealing. Conversely, I am pleased with numbers 1, 2 and 4, which I feel capture the personality of the subjects as well as their environment. Finally, the image of Bryony Cox has been changed from portrait to landscape orientation, to fit in with the rest of the series.

My tutor was away for the whole of August, so I have only recently got the feedback on Assignment 3. It wasn’t as poor as I was expecting, for which I am thankful, but there are definitely some changes which will have to be made before it goes for assessment. Here is a link to the full feedback: 3.HollyWoodward. Going through it in detail, my tutor’s comments are in italics and my responses in plain type.

Overall comments

Overall you have submitted a sound assignment and provided really strong reflective research. Your critical engagement and subsequent analysis has provided the work with depth. The final images do require further interrogation as there is a variant within your composition and this affects the narrative. A little more consideration at the time of shooting and editing would help. I think though that it is a project that as you suggest you should continue with. You raise some interesting points about the role of the female artist and thus supply an interesting foundation for the project.

Good news that the concept was ok, and my tutor was clearly pleased with my background research and my contextualisation in terms of the changing role of the female artist. I agree with his suggestion that some more work is needed on the images, as I outlined in my own reflection on the project. It would have been helpful if I had had a clearer idea before I started on the narrative I was aiming for. I took loads of photographs, but relatively few were suitable for my final project. Fortunately, I have both the option to return and make more photographs of the subjects, and also to collect some new ones next weekend, as the rival Swindon Open Studios is currently taking place.

Feedback on assignment

Points to address:

Clearly you have had issues with your ability to find appropriate subjects. I think that maybe you should try and be less anxious in the future about what you photograph as this has clearly held up your progress. Your overall contextual input is great and it is really apparent that you are enjoying this journey of discovery. I guess it is the ‘fun’ part, taking the images that is harder for you! Remember that you are on a learning journey, you are expected to make mistakes but you will progress through your photography, problems and making images.

Fair point about worrying about it all too much. On the whole, I find not having regular set deadlines to be a positive incentive to my work, but it does leave my mind open to a degree of dithering and uncertainty which would not be possible if a shorter time frame for each assignment was required.

I think that maybe things you could have expanded upon is the location. I find it really interesting that it looks like their studios are within their domestic spaces – sheds in the gardens, rooms in the house etc. In some way you have presented a romantic version of the female artist and idyllic view of the English female craftsperson, it feels very middle class, be interesting to see how a mixed audience respond!

Yes, the studios are all in domestic spaces, which was a part of what I was trying to show. And those spaces are generally very plush, so the middle-class comment has validity too. I was most impressed at the size of the houses the shows took place in, and also their wonderful gardens, and actually asked whether having a lovely location was part of the requirement for inclusion in the event, but apparently not. Just serendipity, they said. However, Marlborough is a very middle class area, and I can imagine that some people might be put off entering because they felt that the event was exclusively for people with lovely houses and gardens. Possibly not a deliberate bias, but one that has perhaps affected the overall feel of the event. It will be interesting to visit some of the Swindon studios, as I suspect they may show a wider range of studio types. For instance, I attended one yesterday in someone’s garage.

Composition on the whole isn’t an issue but I would say that there is a variation of the way that you deal with your subjects. Image 1 and 6 (yes focus is an issue, be aware and take more time at the time of shooting) have a different dynamic to the other images. Here the artists are directly looking at you, the other images depict the subjects engaged in their work, this is a very different perspective that affects the cohesion of the narrative. This is something that you should be reflecting upon and making more considered decisions at the time of the shoot and indeed during the edit.

I agree with this in retrospect, although at the time of shooting it did not seem to be an issue. My original idea had been to photograph the artists with a direct gaze, but my interest in how they go about doing their work became more important as time went on. I like image no 1 a lot, but perhaps it should be changed for something where the artist is at work. For me, no. 6 is the least successful, and I need to have a rethink about it.

With reference to image 6 you should concentrate on just trying to get the face the correct balance, mixing daylight and fluorescent will prove to be problematic due to the different spectrums of light balance. Again though, I would suggest taking more control at the time of shoot. You have that lovely big window to the side allowing for natural light, maybe with more planning you could have turned off the artificial light.

I think he means No 7 here, and I completely agree with the comments. I definitely plan to go back for another shoot with this lady, as the lighting just doesn’t work and I am sure I can do better. It will be easier without all the other people about who were visiting at the same time as me.

I think that you should continue with this project and reflect further upon your contextual input as it has got interesting connotations.

Ok, there’s still some work to do here before submission for assessment, but that is fine. I have the contacts to return and reshoot some of the images, and there are a couple of other artists of whom I was unable to get a reasonable image that I might add as well.

Technically, I am happy with all of the images, except as I mentioned in the assignment itself, the slightly yellow cast on the last image. I feel that numbers 1 and 3 are the best, and ideally I would like to revisit the other artists to make more similar pictures of their workspaces.

Quality of outcome

I would describe the quality of outcome as adequate. The images themselves are functional, but I believe that the contextualisation of them as being not only working spaces, but also expressions of their owners’ identities and their relationship with their partners brings another viewpoint. I enjoyed visiting the artists and we got on very well, so I see that aspect and the consequent possibilities of doing further work with them as being as much a part of the outcome as the images themselves.

Demonstration of creativity

I don’t believe that these images push the boundaries of creativity, but my interpretation of the assignment brief did not allow much room for experimentation. A review of the numerous blog posts which were the route to my finished assignment show that I tried various ideas, but did not feel they fitted the brief adequately.

Context

It has been some considerable time between the submission of this assignment and the previous one. During this time I have not been idle, as shown by the exhibition visits and personal research in the Research and Reflection section of my blog. This has been supplemented by a large amount of collected ideas and learning, particularly around the ideas of place and time which are kept in my two sketchbooks. Alongside this, I have also been working on a project on the concept of time, which I hope will go on show next year at the Thames Valley Group’s exhibition.

I have found the prescriptive nature of this assignment difficult to merge with the personal work, which is most probably the reason for the time it has taken to produce.

The syntax of the studio, from babble to murmur remains not only private, but hermeneutically opaque. Objects, images and texts congregate according to the artist’s esoteric taxonomy, redundant outside of the studio, salient for the artist only. (Pigrum, 2007).

My recent visits to a variety of different studios show how the women concerned have managed to carve out a personal space for themselves in the home environment which allows them to follow their passion. This illustrates the changing relationship between male and female understanding of the way that the home environment is divided alongside an acceptance that those women’s art is considered sufficiently important to justify its own space. In a fascinating research article Gendered Space? (2000) , which many women can relate to, Paula Townsend explains the history of how space in the home has traditionally been divided on gender lines, with women being assumed to have overall control of the space, but in coupled families having no actual space to call their own. The man has historically had his study and/or shed, to which he could retire when he wanted peace or privacy, while in recent times, children often have personal bedrooms which they use for similar purposes. Women, meanwhile, are assumed to have the kitchen as “their space”, despite it being open to all at any time of day or night, and this is a room which is unsuited to longer term hobbies and activities; the table is required three times a day for meals and so needs to be clear of materials regularly, thus limiting women’s artistic endeavours to work that is easy to tidy away and which is portable, i.e. knitting, sewing, drawing.

Women’s increasing presence in the formal workplace and the consequent financial authority this has brought has begun to allow women to demand the same amount of personal space within the home that men have always had, whether it be their own study for private contemplation or a larger space to explore artistic pursuits. It also brings into focus how women and their partners view the work that she does in “her” space. Allocating a specific, unique room for her creativity gives the undertaking a legitimacy which has previously been absent in the gendered view of art pursuits. The possession of a personal studio in the modern world takes art from being a plaything to being a serious undertaking which merits a specific space and indicates independence, respect and personal autonomy as well as money. This lack of respect for women’s artistic value still prevails, as exemplified in Team LPD’s (2015) piece Artists in their Studios, which includes thirty eight artists in their place of work, only three of whom are women. Those three are Georgia O’Keefe, Frida Kahlo and Tamara De Lempika.

Moving away from gender politics, there is also the question of whether a personal studio is a positive or negative aid to creativity. Women often prefer to work in collective groups, sharing spaces and being able to discuss their work in situ. This allows for collaboration and feedback and is popular in arts which require space and funds to house large pieces of equipment, such as furnaces. Others prefer a smaller space, close to the house, where they can work in peace while still being available to the family. And a third group are almost peripatetic, taking their tools with them as they move around. Each group has found a way of carving out a personal space which helps her with the process of making her work.

The studio itself has been a concept for several hundred years, originally appearing in Mediaeval times as the Atelier, where a craftsman would produce his work, accompanied by a series of apprentices, all male. As patronage became the defined way for artists to make a living, they were able to afford bigger studio areas and more assistants until by the 18th century, art was being produced to order on an almost factory scale. With the larger studios came the concept of the Bottega (the workroom) and the Studiolo (the study, a place for contemplation) and a division of thought from action (Wallace, 2014). In the 20th and 21st century, the concept of the art factory was extended ………..

The studio as metaphor

Over and over, references on the subject of studios refer to Pagrum’s excellent article (2007) The ontopology of the artist’s studio as workplace, which delves into the mythology and meaning of the studio. The arrangement of equipment, the ideas boards and mementos that litter the walls and shelves – all serve as a fulcrum for the artist to visualise and plan her work; a messy amalgam of fleeting thoughts and concrete examples which are the influences that inform her own ideas. Bookshelves are particularly interesting as an expression of the work they enjoy and tables overflow with the tools of their trade. Pagrum argues that this heady mix of paraphernalia and tools with ideas and the artist’s experiences merge together to make the studio a shrine to creation, or at least the expectation of creation. This expectation has both positive and negative aspects; the artist retires to this creative space to make her work, but when inspiration is low, the studio can also seem like a prison, with its lowering threat of failure. At the same time, Bain (2005) refers to the need for an artist to construct an identity, and the place of the studio within the construct as a physical expression of that identity.

Each artist’s space tells us as much about them, their personality and their interests as it does about their work. As such, it has been a rich seam of subject matter for artists and photographers for centuries. The subject has been approached by photographers in many ways, and for example, Hossein Amirsadeghi’s (2012) work, Sanctuaries mixes images of people at work with more general portraits of artists in and around their studios. Barbara Yoshida’s fascinating series of 100 studies of women artists (Frank, 2015) focuses on their relationships with their studios more than the space itself, while Kamala Walton’s Works in Progress is more of a personal response to the space and character of different studios in and around Bristol. The Gagosian Museum’s 2015 dual exhibition of how artists and photographers relate to their studios (Architectural Digest, 2015) is an excellent insight into the concept of creation and how different artists express its two sides, while Elina Brotherus’ series Artists at Work looks at the relationship between the subject (the model) and the artist. However, one subject which seems to be lacking is examples of photographers in their studios. Maybe this is because one set of studio lights on a white background looks much like another, or because the modern day photographer’s place of work resembles a computer lab more than an atelier. Perhaps this is something to explore in a later piece of work.

Whichever line of research the author takes to examine the idea of the artist’s studio, it remains a place of mystery and awe, somewhere that is an expression of it’s maker’s personality and identity as well as being a functional space.

“For many years the studio has possessed an aura of glamour, of apartness from the outside world, a place of magic.” (Giles Waterfield, 2009)

Find out about a community that you don’t know much about and tell their story. What window into this world can you access through your role as photographer?

Introduction

Marlborough Open Studios is an annual collaborative event in which forty local artists open their homes and studios over four weekends to allow the public access to them and their work. It is a selling event, but the artists are all happy to talk about what they do without any commitment to buy. Over the course of two weekends, I was lucky enough to see the work of twenty two artists; two were photographers, and the others used a variety of media including printmaking, glasswork, sculpture and collographs. I have discounted the photographers from this project, as I did not feel comfortable about asking them if I could photograph their work. Men were also discounted, being in the minority (less than 30%) in what turned out to be a very female event. Other artists were happy for me to do so and were very willing to explain their techniques for me.

The background work which informed this assignment is outlined in the following posts:

The 20th century rise in woman’s autonomy based on their increasing presence in the formal workplace, and the consequent financial authority this brought has begun to allow women to demand the same amount of personal space within the home that men have always had, whether it be their own study for private contemplation or a larger space to explore artistic pursuits. It also brings into focus how women and their partners view the work that she does in “her” space. Allocating a specific, unique room for her creativity gives the undertaking a legitimacy which has previously been absent in the historically gendered view of art pursuits. As a woman, the possession of a personal studio in the modern world takes art from being a plaything to being a serious undertaking, which indicates independence and personal autonomy as well as financial stability. And for a woman, her own studio is a strong representation of her identity and the value of her work to herself and to her partner, if she has one.

This project is based on a series of visits made under the umbrella of the Marlborough Open Studios Art Trail. Each artist in the Open Studios has been selected by her peer group as being worthy to be a part of a group which showcases the best of what North Wiltshire artists have to offer. My thanks go to the following artists who allowed me to photograph them and their work environment:

The purpose of this assignment was to reveal either a mirror of a community one knows and how it affects the photographer personally, or a window onto a community that the photographer did not previously know. A review of my blog posts for this assignment reveals that I have struggled to settle on a subject for several months, and tried out several different options without success. My initial idea of using mirrors in the literal as well as metaphorical sense using photography en abyme is something I would like to return to later, but I was advised by fellow students that the next iteration using my village’s annual carnival was not working. Thanks are due to fellow student Kate 513940 for her suggestion that I look at the Open Studios for a more revealing subject, and something upon which I could base a windows project.

This was not a linear project, in which the order of the images was important. Of more interest to me was the question of whether to include some of the artworks or to focus purely on the spaces themselves. I decided on the latter because it was better reflective of my background research. My original plan had been to produce a series of diptychs, each showing the artist and one of her pieces, but this seemed too static , on reflection. I also looked at the possibility of showing the artists directly relating to me, the photographer, as the process of capturing the images was so voluble and enjoyable but did not have enough good quality images to produce a series. Like all events of this type, one is having to work “on the hoof” and allowing other visitors to speak to the artists, and so there was a limit to what could be achieved. However, the organiser of the event asked me if I would like to produce some photographs for next year’s catalogue, and suggested that it might be mutually beneficial for me to go back after the Open Studios was over and to spend some time watching and photographing individual artists at work. I may do this over the winter as part of my rework for assessment.

Looking at the series I have produced, I have particular concerns about two images. No. 7 has a slightly yellow cast from being taken in artificial light and this does not fit the visual palette of the other images. Despite considerable effort, I cannot seem to remove this without losing detail in the image. The focus in no. 6 is not quite as sharp as I would have liked, but I think the image should be included as the composition and the artist’s expression are revealing. Conversely, I am pleased with nos 1, 2 and 4, which I feel capture the person as well as their environment. Regarding possible gaps, the inclusion of some painters would have added another element to the series, and I will try to achieve this over the winter.

As mentioned in my previous post, I have been visiting artists who are exhibiting as part of the Marlborough Open Studios event over the last couple of weekends. Quite apart from my interest in seeing what they are producing was my desire to photograph them in their place of work. I had a wonderful time and the great majority of people I talked to were delighted to cooperate. I seem to have finished the photographing section of the project with two extra artworks in the house, but I’d have loved to take more. What seems to have appeared in the photos I took is a variety of casual portraits, images of people’s studios and examples of their work. I feel the contacts show more coherence between the subjects and an overall theme which is specific to the group, unlike my last effort with the local carnival, which lacked anything to root it in a specific place.

My next job is to go through the attached contacts and pick out the ones I intend to edit and use. Fortunately, there is no question about whether they should be colour or monochrome – the colour is important for this series.These images These

I really need to move along with Assignment 3 now, and it is time to put aside some of the other projects I have been exploring in my Personal Reflections. The more I think about the assignment, the more I believe I am over thinking it, and trying to make it too complicated – it really should not be that difficult. I therefore decided to revisit the assignment criteria again, and to me the following are the important aspects that we are asked to consider:-

it should feature a community (more than one person)

it should tell their story

the story should be something we can all relate to

I can choose if the community is one with which I am familiar or not.

I have already photographed various people from my village community for this module, and I have decided to continue this by photographing another village event, this time the Carnival, which takes place this Sunday. This post is by way of preparation, so that I can make the most of the day itself. There will only be one chance to do this, so I have to get it right.

I am intrigued by John Berger’s idea of a photograph “cutting across the continuum of time” (1) and how they can function as historical documents for future generations. An excellent example of how this can be achieved is in Martin Parr’s series Unseen Cities (2) which I reviewed here. In it, Parr examines a way of life which has been repeated for hundreds of years but which seems anachronistic to the current generation. He looks both at the behind-the-scenes aspect and the on-show element to give a rounded picture of the ceremonies and people involved in the City of London.

My previous research on David Hurn’s Tintern Photographic Project (3) series is also relevent to this, as is Paul Strand’s Tir A’Mhurain (4) and Nan Goldin’s The Ballad of Sexual Dependency. from the point of view of my own photographic practice, I prefer the aesthetic of the former two to Goldin’s, and I would like to take the opportunity here to consider Paul Strand’s book in more detail, as I am lucky enough to own a copy.

Strand made it his life’s work to immerse himself into various communities around the world and to make works which have a powerful sense of place as well as the people who lived there. Apart from South Uist, he produced similar works for Egypt, Morocco, France, and Ghana among others. Tir A’Mhurain is a mixture of text and poetry, alongside portraits and landscapes, although it is not entirely clear to me how much of the text was written by Strand and how much by Basil Davidson, who collaborated with him on the book. It was photographed over three months in 1954, and thus the images are black and white, while the aesthetic is realistic. The majority of the portraits are taken as close-ups, although there are some full length ones too of groups and individuals. Strand managed to capture most of them against a fairly plain background, often in a door frame, so that the attention is focused squarely on the person and not their surroundings. The “place” element is supplied by the interweaving images of the countryside and people’s activities within it, mostly farming, fishing and housework. The thing that captures my own attention most is the clothes, which mark the year as being from the past; many of the activities still continue in the Outer Hebrides in much the same way today, so the clothes are what separates the people from now. (In contrast, the clothes in the Martin Parr series are what marks the historical aspect of the ceremonies – in this case they haven’t changed for centuries, and the punctum is that their wearers are seen in very modern situations.)

So, the aim on Sunday will be to achieve a mix of single portraits and street shots, alongside some images which root the village in its past. And for the single portraits I will have to overcome my fear of rejection and ask people directly if I can take their photograph. I will need to take a great many images in order to have sufficient to select a series that not only represents the village, but also my own place in it as an outsider (one isn’t considered a local until one has lived here for several decades) but also an active participant in village life. The issue which I am mulling over now is whether to make the carnival the centrepiece of the series, or to use it as a vehicle to enable me to present a wider range of people than I would normally be able to on a day by day basis. And as a sideline, I also want to try to produce something with a specific unified colour grading. The idea I will be trying to achieve is a representation of the village as it is today as if it were a future historical document. It may also be that I present it in a book style, to allow for more images to be included.